January 06, 2018

Life of a carbon atom fills me with irreligious awe

Here's a scan of a page from a wonderful book by Caleb Scharf, "The Zoomable Universe: An Epic Tour Through Cosmic Scale, from Almost Everything to Nearly Nothing."

After I highlighted the section in yellow, I wound my way through the nineteen steps in the scientifically-valid journey of a carbon atom that begins 10 billion years ago inside a massive star, and ends today with the eating of a potato.

When I read the page below this morning, I found it surprisingly moving. Sure, I was familiar with the idea that we are all made of stardust, since the heavier atoms arise from stellar explosions.

But tracing the history of one of the countless carbon atoms in my body left me with a feeling of cosmic awe. Even though I'm hugely limited in time and space, my atoms have a history that spans much of the universe.

If they could talk, what a tale they could tell.

People turn to religion in order to feel like their lives have meaning. Well, science can fill that role also. And the beauty of science is that it is true.

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Don't be-fool innocent gullible people , tell the world what is powering the movement of electrons in carbon atom since billions of years . Is there any motor there or generator there ??
As Baba Faqir Chand warned people from mercy hospital , if you be-fool innocent gullible people you won't be spared.

OMG This is magnificent!
Thank you for sharing it.
The very idea of trying to overlay this with any theology at all is an insult to creation, whatever creation is.

If there is God, surely He or She would want us to love this incredible reality, as your scan depicts, entirely on its own without having to do anything to it, overlay it, cover it up, interpret it.

It is perfect and any other thought around it only lessens this perfection.

To see it, to perceive it, to honor it in the awe that rises within us, there is no higher spirituality.

When we re-make creation or the creator in our own image, in our own depictions or notions, we insult that...whether creation, universal consciousness, whatever we choose to call it.

But to witness is in its pure form, without interpretation, to be awed by it. To be filled with joy by it. To understand I am part if it. It owns me. I'm carbon atoms, y'all!! And that is my brotherhood to everyone and everything else!

Carbon atoms don't have fears & phobias , but people do have them. I again reiterate , don't be-fool innocent people by serving them half-baked truths. You won't be spared.
Mischievous atheist , tell people what is powering the movement of electrons in carbon atom.
Tell , Tell .... Why don't you tell ??

This is why we should all get closer to our Carbon heritage!
There is great wisdom there.
Before language, there was Carbon!
And what made Carbon is whatever we limited minds like to call the force of the creator.

"The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer.
And I am dumb to tell the crooked rose
My youth is bent by the same wintry fever.

The force that drives the water through the rocks
Drives my red blood; that dries the mouthing streams
Turns mine to wax.
And I am dumb to mouth unto my veins
How at the mountain spring the same mouth sucks.

The hand that whirls the water in the pool
Stirs the quicksand; that ropes the blowing wind
Hauls my shroud sail.
And I am dumb to tell the hanging man
How of my clay is made the hangman’s lime.

The lips of time leech to the fountain head;
Love drips and gathers, but the fallen blood
Shall calm her sores.
And I am dumb to tell a weather’s wind
How time has ticked a heaven round the stars.

And I am dumb to tell the lover’s tomb
How at my sheet goes the same crooked worm."
Dylan Thomas

'The Life of a Carbon Atom' is one of the reasons I enjoy science. It is always with a sense of wonder that writers and presenters convey the story of nature in their books and programmes. Perhaps it is the inquisitiveness and wonder from childhood that some enquiring minds take into adulthood.

Science investigates the how; to ask 'why' is, I suspect, only asked from doubt and insecurity. Just as we strive to ensure our physical survival perhaps we strive (think or believe) to hard to ensure some other survival after we are dead. Life as it is, is amazing; to want it to continue beyond what is natural can result in a life of conflict, fear and bitterness.

Here is one of my favourite quotes from Darwin's 'The Origin of Species' :-

"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."